Tourism Leader: Use Tax Dollars To Help Pay For Beauty Pageant

February 20, 1987|By JULIE EAGLE, Staff Writer

A Palm Beach County tourism promoter has recommended that tourism tax dollars help pay for the Miss Black America pageant.

``This is a very exciting event which clearly has direct tourism potential as well as great public relations spinoffs,`` Michael Danella, executive vice president of Discover Palm Beach County Inc., said in a memorandum released Thursday.

Danella recommended financing a $144,000 request with a combination of tourist tax dollars and general county and municipal funds.

``Certainly we`re delighted to know there is some sensitivity to what we conceive to be a cultural uplift for the county,`` said the Rev. Derek King, a spokesman for the Aug. 22 pageant.

``This event could help us answer the question: `Is minority business a viability for us or is Palm Beach County still going to be perceived as an upscale, unaffordable destination?`` Danella said.

J. Morris Anderson, whose South Carolina firm syndicates the pageant for television, said the 1987 20th anniversary pageant would include a three- minute promotion of Palm Beach County, including a toll-free number to call for tourism materials.

By tracking any calls from the pageant`s audience, Discover could gauge the tourism impact. Danella, who has recommended being host to the pageant for one to three years, expects to meet with a steering committee on the matter next week.

He said the event meshes well with a $16,000 ``downscale`` ad campaign Discover is launching next month aimed at people in the Northeast who are ages 25 to 35 and have household incomes of $25,000 to $35,000.

Meanwhile, spokesman King, the nephew of the late civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., said he was less concerned about the tourism impact than about promoting an event to help foster community spirit.

``I think it does have a tourism element or a magnetic effect. (But) I think it behooves any community-conscious (leaders) to embrace cultural and ethnic events. It does add a sense of communalism,`` said King, the pastor of Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church in West Palm Beach.